The trip almost never began. Days before the tip-off of the African Women's Volleyball Championship in Nairobi, the Cameroonian delegation was still stuck at home while its rivals were already landing in Kenya — a departure delay that raised the threat of a forfeit, against a backdrop of rushed preparation and an incomplete coaching staff flagged as early as February.
On court, the Indomitable Lionesses flipped the script. Unbeaten and without conceding a single set through the entire pool stage, they brushed aside Uganda in the quarter-final (25-18, 25-20, 25-18) to reach the last four, the only side other than Egypt with such a clean run.
Thursday's semi-final ran into the hosts. Carried by the Kasarani arena, Kenya — defending champions and the continent's most decorated nation — won 3-0 (25-19, 25-20, 25-20). Cameroon matched them in the opening set before slipping away at the close of each frame.
That left the third-place match against Rwanda, to avoid going home empty-handed. The Cameroonians settled it in three straight sets (25-17, 25-16, 25-19), never letting their opponent claw back. A bronze medal — and, above all, the third and final African ticket to the 2027 World Cup, which FIVB reserves for the continent's top three nations.
The title went to Egypt, who beat Kenya in the final (25-22, 25-15, 25-15): a first continental crown in twenty-three years for the Pharaonnes, who also pocket the African berth for the Los Angeles 2028 Olympic Games.
Cameroonian women's volleyball comes out of the fortnight rehabilitated, after years of federation turmoil — contested officials, unpaid bonuses, national teams sent abroad without preparation. Before the semi-finals, sports minister Narcisse Mouelle Kombi had boiled the instruction down to two words: keep the 'fighting spirit'.
Three weeks after the footballers' first continental trophy in Rabat, a second women's national team brings back a medal and a World Cup place. Enough to feed a point Cameroon's sports machine still struggles to own: its women's results are moving faster than its budgets.
